The conundrum of categorising requirements: managing requirements for learning on the move

This paper reports on the experience of eliciting and managing requirements on a large European-based multinational project, whose purpose is to create a system to support learning using mobile technology. The project used the socio-cognitive engineering methodology for human-centered design and the Volere shell and template to document requirements. We provide details about the project below, describe the Volere tools, and explain how and why we used a flexible categorization scheme to manage the requirements. Finally, we discuss three lessons learned: (1) provide a flexible mechanism for organizing requirements, (2) plan ahead for the RE process, and (3) do not forget 'the waiting room

Broken Books

Broken Books is a digital humanities project built collaboratively between Pius XII Memorial Library and the Center for Digital Humanities of Saint Louis University. The goal of the Broken Books is to offer a digital solution to the problem of studying detached leaves from premodern manuscripts. Using online images, descriptive metadata, and nimble digital tools for relating these, Broken Books provides allows any researcher to manage a reconstruction project that also permits outside users to add images and information to it. Although still under development, Broken Books will encourage new contributions to manuscripts studies by facilitating the reconstruction of manuscripts that some time in their history were broken apart and scattered among various locations

Whitewashing or amnesia: a study of the construction of race in two Midwestern counties

Title from PDF of title page viewed January 27, 2020Dissertation advisor: Theresa TorresVitaIncludes bibliographical references (page 281-321)Thesis (Ph.D.)--Department of Sociology, Department of History. University of Missouri--Kansas City, 2019This inter-disciplinary dissertation utilizes sociological and historical research methods for a critical comparative analysis of the material culture as reproduced through murals and monuments located in two counties in Missouri, Bates County and Cass County. Employing Critical Race Theory as the theoretical framework, each counties’ analysis results are examined. The concepts of race, systemic racism, White privilege and interest-convergence are used to assess both counties continuance of sustaining a racially imbalanced historical narrative. I posit that the construction of history of Bates County and Cass County continues to influence and reinforces systemic racism in the local narrative. Keywords: critical race theory, race, racism, social construction of reality, white privilege, normality, interest-convergenceIntroduction -- The historical context: understanding the troubled past -- The standard: Cass County -- The exception: Bates County -- Critical Race Theory analysis of murals and monuments -- Where to go from here -- Appendix A. Mural/monument analysis worksheet -- Appendix B. Primary texts analysis workshee

Writing Rubrics as Formative Assessments in an Elementary Classroom

This qualitative study with second and third grade students investigated what happens during the co-construction of a writing rubric between students and teacher for persuasive writing, based on mentor texts. It also sought to explore what happens when elementary students use a student-generated writing rubric during the writing process and how a student-generated writing rubric might influence students’ writing. Video-recordings, observations of the lessons and interviews with students about co-constructing the rubric captured the process used to co-construct the rubric. Observations of the students using the rubric, interviews after using the rubric, and a survey about using the rubric were administered. Pre-assessment and post assessment writing samples were compared. Co-constructing a rubric gave the students multiple exposures to the elements of the persuasive genre, which increased their understanding and produced improved persuasive reviews. The third grade focus group demonstrated the ability to self-assess their writing with the rubric, some students needing more scaffolding than others. The implications from this study are that a co-constructed writing rubric can be a tool for student engagement and understanding of a genre and self-assessment

The Learning Grid and E-Assessment using Latent Semantic Analysis

E-assessment is an important component of e-learning and e-qualification. Formative and summative assessment serve different purposes and both types of evaluation are critical to the pedagogicalprocess. While students are studying, practicing, working, or revising, formative assessment provides direction, focus, and guidance. Summative assessment provides the means to evaluate a learner's achievement and communicate that achievement to interested parties. Latent Semantic Analysis (LSA) is a statistical method for inferring meaning from a text. Applications based on LSA exist that provide both summative and formative assessment of a learner's work. However, the huge computational needs are a major problem with this promising technique. This paper explains how LSA works, describes the breadth of existing applications using LSA, explains how LSA is particularly suited to e-assessment, and proposes research to exploit the potential computational power of the Grid to overcome one of LSA's drawbacks

A Process Improvement Project to Increase Referral and Documentation Rates for Diabetic Retinopathy Screening

Abstract Background: Approximately 5.3 million Americans, aged 18 and over, carry a diagnosis of diabetic retinopathy (DR). By the year 2050 this number is expected to triple without effective healthcare intervention. Approximately 4.8% of the global blindness is attributable to DR, a silent, progressive, microvascular complication of diabetes. Best practice dictates immediate screening at time of diagnosis of Type II Diabetes Mellitus (T2DM) and biennial screenings thereafter, yet this need is often unmet. Purpose: This study is a continuation of a process put into place by Dr. Michelle Campbell in October 2017 at the Norton Community Medical Associates Mount Washington practice and was to determine effectiveness of this intervention. This intervention involved formal referral with a specific form documenting the results of the ophthalmological screening being faxed back to the primary care office and scanned into the patient’s electronic health record (EHR). Methods: This study used a retrospective chart review for the period 1 January 2017 to 1 May 2017 and 1 January 2018 to 1 May 2018 to determine the number of formal referrals to ophthalmology pre- and post-implementation as well as the number of formal documentation forms received during both time periods. Inclusion criteria included T2DM, ICD-10 codes E11.0-E11.9, and ages between 18 years and 70 years. One hundred charts were selected by the Information Technology Department for both pre- and post-implementation review. Results: SPSS Software was used to analyze the data. A chi square test was used to measure these results. Pre- and post-implementation referrals yielded a p-value of 0.321 which was not statistically significant; however, pre- and post-implementation documentation yielded a p-value of .016 which was significant, unfortunately in the opposite direction than was hoped. Keywords: Diabetic Retinopathy (DR), Electronic Health Record (EHR), Type II Diabetes Mellitus (T2DM